5 Signs That You’re Overtraining
Is your training not feeling the same? Have you been exercising constantly and for some reason.. you feel worse? Your problem could be that you’re overtraining. While some believe in the “no days off” principle, our muscles are building and recovering when we are at rest, not when we are working them. Having a balance with our training and nutrition is key to seeing results, and sleep is also just as important. Incorporting rest days into your routine shouldn’t feel like a setback, sometimes it can help take our fitness further. Knowing when to rest is key, here are some signs you may need to take one yourself…
Overuse Injuries - We have all heard the saying “too much of a good thing” and this can also happen with working out. Injury can happen by accident, but when we see the same ones happen over and over again this can be a bad sign. If our technique is proper and we are fully fuelled there should be no reason for injury right? However if we are doing the same things a bit too much, this can lead to reoccurring injuries. Some common ones can be shin splints, tennis elbow, and stress fractures.
Feeling Constantly Fatigued - If you are not sleeping adequately that is one thing, but if you are resting properly while following a heavy training program and still feeling fatigued all of the time it could be a sign of overtraining. Doing a workout alone may seem like a very draining task after a while, and will only continue to become more tiresome. Feeling mentally as well as physically drained is common when someone is doing too much. Make sure you are letting yourself fully recover after workouts, our muscles can take up to 72 hours sometimes to heal if they have been through a high intensity training session.
Decrease In Performance - If you are following a program and you should be seeing progression but the opposite is happening, you could be doing too much. You may not be able to do the weights you could do before, even though you should be attempting heavier. Before this happens we will usually start to hit a plateau, doing the same weights without being able to progress. Pushing and pushing without adequate rest will eventually regress our hard work and our muscles can’t adapt to the load they are being put under.
Poor Sleep - Overtraining can affect our ability to handle stress. When our body feels like it is under constant stress we can have a hard time falling asleep, constantly feeling wired thus also affecting our performance and attitude towards training.
Lack Of Appetite - Training usually boosts our metabolism and should make us feel more hungry, especially when we are weight training. If you have a sudden loss of appetite it could be a sign of hormonal imbalance due to over training and high stress levels.
Putting our body under stress does make us adapt and get stronger, but there is always a happy medium.
Proper nutrition can also play a part in feeling overtrained. If we don't fuel properly before workouts we will not be able to give our best performance!